Zone.
Documentation, a record of impressions. Photography, painting, artefacts

Zone is an area that is not a part of the urban tissue any more. It used to be but it is not any more. Something failed, something got dirty, somebody has become zestless, or moneyless, and in effect a certain area has unexpectedly become a downtown reserve.

Our beloved forestrial but mild climate causes that in next to no time the Zone overgrows - first with ruderal plants, and a moment later with bushes and trees. Birds twitter, cats, foxes, martens leer from among thickly growing plants. Ivy blows up brick binding material, walls crack, birch trees grow on walls that break into pieces, and pillows of velveteen moss fill up cracks. It does not mean that the people do not use the area any more. No, not at all. People from the neighbourhood work together with plants, fungi and animals to raze remnants of civilization. They take metal. They fertilize abundantly. They take all that might be useful to them and leave in the Zone all that they will not use any more. It is a real opportunity to hide something, or do something not to be seen by anybody's undesirable eyes in several hectares or several meters of nobody's land in the very downtown. One may bury a dead body, pour out spoilt engine oil from the barrel, defecate friskily, crucify a cat, bury a dog, and have a sexual intercourse. One may burn stolen cables to get copper. One may be the happiest child in the world and have a Base in one's own hole in the earth, or a house on the tree, or a shelter made of hardboard and tyres. Who shall feel happier than a little treasure hunter who is rummaging waste developing a narrative aloud?

A tired homeless cat has dug in leaves, cats howl their March songs, the sun shines, it rains, and the Zone grows. Virginia creeper extends its alert clinging tentacles and grabs other buildings and yards to cover them all. If the city is weak, and business is not good enough, the Zone is ready to absorb the whole district and reach out for others. To merge in one with its suburban colonies and triumph finally. If the city is strong, bulldozers will soon crush all this pulsating, creeping life. New buildings shall cover the Zone, and all these fickle creatures stop slipping past in the jungle of nettle, celandine and supple ash trees, Homo erectus, with its regular daily rhythm, will start marching on again.

It might happen but not necessarily. For the time being, we wander among relics of the Zone past of which we are more proud or less proud. We look at remains of the building resembling an empty skull. What were you? A factory? A dairy plant? Unimportant. Now you are a house of bats, a privy of a tramp and a mosquito hatchery place. In an instant you will become a bedding course for an abiogenous flower bed.

The longer we are here alone, the weirder we become. We enter the explorer's mode, the Zone is ours, and any other person is an intruder. When in the alpha state, we become more sensitive to reflections and shadows. Surprising details and not less surprising general plans. When we come back here again, we will be able to notice subtle changes. Somebody has rearranged things. Burnt a patch of ground. Still smoking. Water has frozen, or unfrozen. Something has blossomed, or withered. A new pile of after-reconstruction work waste appeared, glazed tiles - floor tiles.

Long live the Zone! Long live a lonely wanderer! Long live the death of the city!